Drabbles
by BluishBleach
Summary: Alex Rider is going through some hard times. From a set of 23 writing prompts. First up: Insomnia.
1. Insomnia

**Insomnia**

Alex couldn't sleep.

He lay awake that night, staring at the ceiling, hands fisting his sheets in a white-knuckled grip.

Blood was dripping from the plaster above him, rhythmically splattering drops of red into his eyes. They would land on his tense forehead and run down the crevices of his face, mingling with his tears.

There was a pool of blood collected on the ceiling, settled among the rough bumps of the textured surface. More was seeping through the corners of the room as he watched, puddling above his head, glimmering darkly in the dull shine of the moon.

_It's not real_, he told himself, eyes full of paralyzed fear. _It's __**not real**_**.**

But it felt like it.

So Alex stayed awake, petrified, soaking in the blood of his friends, his enemies, and of strangers.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: I really believe that there is no way that Alex could _not _develop PTSD, with all that he has been through. :( Poor little dude...**

**Ah! Also! I got this set of prompts from RayneWolfspeaker, over on deviantArt. I do not own these at all. :D**


	2. Opposites

**Opposites**

On the surface, Alex Rider was nothing like Tom Harris.

Alex was stoic, sardonic, and blasé. Tom was passionate, extremely extroverted, and took things to heart.

Alex could go days without eating, talking, or playing any sort of game. In fact, he often did so.

Tom was ADHD. He couldn't go five _minutes_ without _fidgeting. _

They didn't even _look _alike. Alex was fair-haired with dark, quiet brown eyes, tanned skin, and a hard mouth.

Tom, with black hair, a deep, yet twinkling blue gaze, and pale skin. His smile was as wide as the galaxy.

Most people wondered why on _earth_ they were friends. In fact, they wondered how they _could _be friends. They just seemed too different for it to work.

The years had made Alex grow cold, a sheen of granite-like ice growing over his heart. The world had also affected Tom, though in different ways. Where Alex had grown freezing, he had been made burning. His world was alight with fire- the fire of anger, the fire of fear, and the fire of knowing that life was made for the broken, the shattered, and the ones who were lost.

The world was made for the people like him and Alex.

So, while on the surface, they had absolutely nothing in common, if you were to look _just a little deeper_, to just scratch the surface of their doppelgänger relationship, you would see that you were quite wrong.

They had everything in common.


	3. Twilight

**Twilight**

Alex wasn't a day person.

And actually, he wasn't a night person either.

With the sun shining high, Alex's spirits were low. With a clear, bright view of the world, he was able to see just how much he had lost. The gentle rays of the sun shone through the suspended dust particles floating throughout all of the rooms of his empty, silent house, exposing just how alone he truly was.

When the moon was up, though, it wasn't any better.

In the dark, memories came to him, twisting his dreams and thoughts and making him so deathly scared, that even if he couldn't get to sleep, he couldn't fully stay awake either. Nightmares hunted him when his eyes were closed, monsters of the past, twisted into bloody things with claws of bone. But even when his eyes were open, he was still dreaming.

So no, the night certainly wasn't his favourite time either.

No, Alex lived for the twilights. He lived for the twilights, the dawns, the dusks, and the afterglows. He lived for the time of change, when the sun was just peeking over the hills, painting the sky in washes of orange and pink and red and every hue in between.

He lived for the times when he didn't have to be afraid.


	4. Touch

**Touch**

When people touched him, Alex flinched.

He couldn't help it, he just… flinched.

In the past, he had been hurt. He had been broken and bruised and violated and all of that approximated to _pain._

Whenever Tom brushed against him, or patted him on the back, or even gave him a _fist bump_, his skin crawled.

His body burned, and though he knew it wasn't true, it felt like he was doused in gasoline- splashed with fear and covered in tension.

Alex was messed up; he knew that. Others were beginning to truly recognize that fact as well. At school, his teachers stared when he walked into their classrooms. When he sat down in the cafeteria to eat, he knew that the other students were aware too. He knew by the way they watched and muttered among themselves, like he was a rumour to be passed along lines.

But he _could not help it._

The past had screwed with him, made him cautious and suspicious and wary.

Alex wasn't used to any good sort of touch- and that was what pained him the most.


	5. Eyes

**Eyes**

Some say that the eyes are the windows to the soul, and some say that your eyes reflect your deepest desires. They say that you can know your true friends by taking a glance into their eyes, and seeing the transparency gazing back. You can tame animals with your eyes, or start riots in the streets. Your eyes can hold galaxies and stars and the twist and whirl of the expanding cosmos.

Alex Rider didn't understand any of this.

The way Alex saw it, your eyes were _organs_. They were _body parts_, which helped you _see._ His were brown. Tom's were blue. Jack's were red, because blood was soaking her face in his dreams.

Eyes weren't mysterious and they didn't hold secrets. Life didn't work that way.


	6. Loss

**Loss**

A lot of people lost a lot of things. Alex knew that Michael Allistor in his Calculus class had lost his pet Labrador a while back. The dog had run away in the night, apparently. Michael had left the back door unlocked and somehow the canine had escaped.

Alex also knew that Michael blamed himself. It wasn't hard to figure out. Michael was offering up a reward for anyone who found the dog- 100 pounds. It was his own money. Michael's parents were pretty well off, if the Mercedes Michael drove to school was any indication of their wealth, but Michael was putting up his own pocket change.

He probably felt guilty about leaving the door unlocked. Such a simple thing. Forget to turn the lock. Forget to latch it shut. You don't have just a quiet house and no pet, but shame and regret.

Alex knew a little something about that.

It was a bit more than just leaving the door unlocked, however. It was like getting on an airplane to Egypt and taking your sister with you (your sister in every way that counted). It was taking her with you when you knew, deep in your heart, deep in the shredded remains of your soul, that it was a bad idea. It was a bad idea and you did it anyway because you wanted to think that things might just be okay for once- the way they never were. It was watching your sister, the last bit of any family that you had, slam the car door and drive off into the blazing sun in a land drier and dustier than anything you had ever imagined. It was the flames that screamed and shrieked and tore you apart and filled you up and drowned you in pain that would never _never _leave.

Alex hoped that Michael would find his dog. It wasn't, after all, possible to replace something so loved.


End file.
